


Tinkering is Best Left in Capable Hands

by ImperfectAlias



Series: From Here to Tomorrow [1]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe, Android/Cyborg AU, Gen, In which pretty much everyone has some kind of technological enhacement on their person, Mentioned Nyx Ulric, Technically MT!Prompto, mentions of racism/xenophobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-11
Updated: 2017-11-11
Packaged: 2019-01-31 19:59:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12689217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ImperfectAlias/pseuds/ImperfectAlias
Summary: "Of all the things Ignis Scientia had expected to wake up to, a figure looming over him was not quite what he’d had in mind. "After waking up in a little service shop in the Red District of Insomnia, Ignis meets a mechanic named Prompto - who seems to have disassembled his left arm.At least he has the decency to look guilty.





	Tinkering is Best Left in Capable Hands

“And _that_ should just… about… do it!”

Of all the things Ignis Scientia had expected to wake up to, a figure looming over him was not quite what he’d had in mind. He stared up at the blurred figure for a moment or so, squinting to try and sharpen his vision. “My vision…” he trailed after a second, blinking when his sight failed to change. A glitch in the programming, perhaps?

The figure above him seemed to pause as well - before he was practically flinging himself away from Ignis in a flurry of movement. The other babbled incessantly, the sound of things being moved haphazardly following after him. “Oh man - I didn’t think - _shit_ \- sorry, let me just-!” Ignis let his eyes close at the sound of things clattering to the floor. Maybe he could run an internal fix-it program - as long as the damage wasn’t physical, it should work. “I have some old frames - like _super_ old stuff - ‘specially made for implants - nothing fancy, but they should work! I really didn't mean for you to wake up like that-!”

How exactly had he ended up here, again? Was he heavily damaged at all? Ignis found himself having a hard time feeling most of his left arm. “Where am I, exactly?” Ignis asked instead, tilting his head in the direction of the noise the young man was making.

“Oh, right - right - this is The Keep!” the man said quickly, scrambling back into what Ignis could only assume was a chair seated beside him. Ignis felt a small weight being put on the bridge of his nose as the other continued, “I mean it’s a name in progress though - I’ve heard most people have been calling this place The Garage - but that’s not really a name, I guess - but it’s what the locals call this place - anyway - you should try opening your eyes now!”

And open his eyes Ignis did, blinking almost groggily as he focused his sight as best he could. He seemed to now be sporting a pair of rather aged spectacles - given by how even his model of eyes took more than a couple seconds to adjust to them. “...Thank you,” he finally half-muttered, gaze moving to his left arm. The cover plates had been removed with obvious care, - the nerves in his shoulder having been disconnected cleanly enough, as well - but the bespectacled man couldn’t help the downward tilt his lips took at the idea of an amatuer messing with his wiring and mechanisms. Most of his parts were not even out on the market, yet.

“Hopefully those’ll help with your sight - you might have a cracked lens or two. I would’ve tried to fix it, but - I dunno - I’m not too into opening up heads without permission, and all the spare parts I have are way outdated by you... probably by some eight or nine years, going by all your nerve fibers alone,” the young man spoke with a sheepish edge to his tone. “Sorry about your arm - I had to tap out some dents and make sure nothing was broken inside - a few wires got severed, but I managed to put them back together with what I’ve got here… had to disconnect the nerves in your shoulder though - but I’ll be able to reconnect them, no problem!”

“I appreciate it - I would prefer to not feel someone taking my arm apart without my knowledge.” Ignis finally let his gaze sweep over the man sat beside him - unruly blonde hair and blue eyes, with a sheepish grin to match. He was smeared with grease. “You’re filthy,” Ignis observed aloud. The entire place was - though perhaps it was an organized chaos since Ignis could clearly see labels on boxes. He seemed to be in some kind of servicing shop.

The blonde laughed after giving a wince. “Okay - yeah - I deserved that one, but you would’ve probably woken up in pain if I'd just left it. It wasn’t a tough fix, anyway - like I said, a quick reconnection and some reshaping to the arm plates... and I was working on another order when you came in - sorry about the grease - gloves are mostly clean, though!”

Ignis stared at the other for a moment, watching him start to squirm under his gaze. “Is there anything else I should know?” he asked, tone a touch sharper than intended. “I would prefer you tell me whilst also putting my arm back together.”

The blonde, clearly having taken the hint, immediately moved to fiddle with the inner workings of Ignis’ arm. “Well - my friend brought you in - Nyx - he runs the bar down the road - well - more like co-runs - but yeah, real cool guy and,” the blond babbled for a moment before stopping himself. “Wait, no, sorry - I’m getting off track - but you’ve got some scratches - and I mean like you had catnip in your pockets and a group of feral cats mauled you for it, kinda scratches. Got it pretty bad across your face - the left side of your face, mostly.”

As he moved his right hand to trace along his face, fingers skirting over a few jagged indentations in the surface, Ignis asked, “And your name would be?”

“But I already introduced myself…?” The blond paused for a moment, expression twisting in confusion before he quite nearly gasped. “Oh, Six - I - you were unconscious - oh, that sounds weird - don’t think too hard about that - I’m Prompto! Nice to meet you!”

Right hand moving to adjust the glasses on his nose, Ignis sighed. “Ignis Scientia. A pleasure,” he stated simply, green gaze level with that of Prompto’s.

“Nice to meet’ya, Ig -” the blond started, only for his jaw to drop and his words to fail him. “Oh my Six - _oh_ -” Prompto looked from Ignis’ face, to the open arm, and back again - his expression twisting into a pained wince, running a hand through his bangs. “You’re not pulling my leg or anything, right?”

Ignis rose an eyebrow, a frown pulling his lips downward. “Care to expand on that?” he prompted.

“Well, your name - I mean - Crystal Corp. - you,” Prompto stammered out, leaning back in his chair as his eyes narrowed a bit at the face of the other. He took a deep breath before exhaling through his mouth. “I mean your parts are pretty high - but I - oh, Six - I’m doing maintenance on one of the highest paid people in Eos - _oh, shit_ -” Prompto just about squeaked, his head turning away from Ignis in a look of clear distress and horror, his hand moving to run down his face. “Now you’ve gone and done it-”

“Ah, I see,” Ignis hummed after a moment, effectively cutting the blond off, shifting a bit in his own seat. “I assumed you had already known. I do believe my identification was in my bag.”

Prompto let out a chuckle - though is came out sounding more like a prolonged gasp. “I haven’t really had time to look through your stuff -” the young man paused before he gave a quick wave of his arms - “not that I would! Because that’s creepy and rude! But I mean - you were pretty beat up - Nyx said it looked like you were in a hit and run kind of deal.”

“You couldn’t will yourself to look through my bag before I regained consciousness,” Ignis mused, eyes half lidded as he spoke slowly. “But you still felt the need to take apart my arm.”

Prompto’s face took a particular shade of bright pink as he rubbed the back of his neck. “Okay - yeah - I guess that’s a weird thing… a weird thing to do now that I think about it - but, I mean - you would have woken up in pain, in some random place. And it wasn’t like you were going to wake up without some extra help - I guess you got hit pretty hard? Or at least you hit the sidewalk pretty hard?”

“Yes, I gathered.” Ignis let his eyes close again before he sighed sharply, pinching the bridge of his nose for a moment. He supposed he should be thankful for that, at least. “I’ll have my employers reimburse you for your time, erm - Prompto..?”

The young man shifted in his chair again, pulling up one of his legs to rest his boot against the knee of his other leg. “Oh - uh - Argentum.” He cleared his throat. “Look - I’m really sorry about your arm - but I’m actually pretty good at my job - kind of - well I… I mean I work with arms a lot - wow I’m just digging a deeper grave, huh? Haha… am I going to get into trouble for -” Prompto made a flapping gesture with his hand at Ignis’ arm “- this?”

Cracking his eyes open once more, Ignis eyed the blond curiously. The bespectacled man wasn’t exactly in a position to make threats, considering how his left arm was being tended to. Prompto was either overly welcoming… or terribly ignorant of the power he had over the situation. “...As long as everything is put back as it should be,” Ignis replied slowly, lips tilting upward at one side, “I don’t see a reason for there to be any need for me to call anyone on you.”

“Oh - well - that’s good then - I’ll have this arm up and running in no time!” Prompto grinned, his shoulders relaxing as he turned back to the arm in question. “Do you have any idea what happened, though? I mean - I know that this isn’t exactly the safest place in Insomnia, but… but I mean…?”

“Yes? Go on.”

Prompto gave a jerky movement of a shrug. “You don’t tend to get people like you around here?” he tried. “I mean… I mean people that look - er - people with a lot of money? Unless they’re doing something they probably shouldn’t?”

“Are you insinuating-?” Ignis frowned, tone growing sharp and his eyes narrowing.

“No! No, no - I mean - maybe? You don’t seem like a bad guy… don’t get me wrong or anything - Crystal Corp. seems like a clean company - no serious scandals,” Prompto shrugged again, eyes flickering from Ignis’ arm to his face. He was, rather meticulously, checking over all of the little nerve fibers. “Look - I’m just a little guy in the Red District - but what’s the Vice Prez of one of the biggest companies in Eos doing here?”

“Reconnaissance,” Ignis replied immediately, as if the answer was obvious.

“What?” Prompto asked with a frown. “For what?”

Ignis mirrored the blond. “You asked what I was doing here, and I answered you - are you really that daft?” he drawled, clearly having grown exasperated. Did he need to spell out everything for this young man?

“ _Geeze_ \- sorry I asked.”

Ignis gave another long sigh, his shoulders sagging against the back of his seat. He let his frustrations fester for a moment or so, taking a second to exhale slowly, before speaking again.  “...No - that was... rude of me - it was a reasonable question, given the situation. Forgive me if I’m… not not in the best of moods.”

The tight smile Prompto replied with made Ignis _almost_ feel guilty. “Nah - I get it. You woke up in a weird place with a scrawny blond guy messing with your arm - not to mention that you’re not exactly at one hundred percent. Totally justified! Anyone would be a bit under the weather.”

Ignis sighed again, putting up a hand to stop Prompto before he could ramble again. “Regardless, I apologize. You’ve been nothing but kind,” he remarked, focusing on keeping his tone as gentle as possible. “I was collecting data for the company - we’ve been looking into how to better get products and models into the Red District - but we need to know what is necessary here. It’s unlikely that people here need something cosmetic over something useful.”

“That’s… not really your choice,” Prompto hummed out after a second, moving one of the arm plates over the back of Ignis’ forearm. He moved a small, pen-like device over where one plate met the other - effectively sealing them into place. “I mean… maybe some people want something cosmetic here.”

“I’m well aware - but it’s all that can be done at the moment. As you said, many of the parts here are outdated at best. If we can slowly integrate newer technology, it’ll help everyone in the area be more compatible with them,” Ignis explained, the fingers on his left hand twitching at the prickly feeling of nerve fibers being reattached to surface plates. “It’ll also make the process cheaper for everyone.”

“Mhmm,” the blond hummed again. “What about competition from the Magitek Facility? Their parts are the ones getting sold around here.”

“Why would anyone in their right mind buy anything from them? Their processes are entirely inhumane. I was hardly aware that they sold the brand within Insomnia walls - outside of small parts and pieces.”

“It’s cheaper,” Prompto replied evenly, glancing up at Ignis before looking back at his arm. “It’s also… kind of like a brand thing - only you can’t… swap.”

That made Ignis pause, brow growing furrowed. Of course he knew… certain things about the opposing company, but it was another thing to hear it from someone else firsthand. “What do you mean?”

“The M.T. brand… something about it corrupts coding. A lot of people can’t do a total upgrade from it without a pretty big medical bill,” Prompto shrugged, another jerking movement of his shoulders. “It’s even more common with refugees from outside the walls.”

Ignis’ felt his expression twist. “So it… works off of addiction, then.”

“...Something like that.”

The two fell into silence, Prompto working away at Ignis’ arm. “...You’re awfully open to talking about this with a stranger, being mostly composed of M.T. parts like you are,” Ignis spoke quietly as Prompto moved up to his shoulder. “I could have been an M.T. researcher, for all you knew.”

“Your workings are too clean to be M.T. - I’m actually pretty good at my job, if I do say so myself.” Prompto, to his credit, didn’t stutter in his work. “What gave me away?” he asked with a wry smile.

“Your right arm. The seam lines are characteristic of the Facility - I can also see a bit of a barcode peeking out from under your work glove. The design is also rather characteristic of M.T.”

“I guess your eyes are working pretty well, huh - all things considered?” The blond moved to rub at the top of his right glove, a self-conscious movement if Ignis ever saw one. “... but, yeah. I’ve seen M.T. do a lot to people - a lot of bad things,” he mused quietly. “Like I said, it’s big on refugees. A lot of people couldn’t get ahold of C.C. tech as fast as they needed it. Some people just can’t get clearance because of their status.”

“...I see.” Ignis gave another long sigh. He seemed to be doing that a lot around this young man. “That’s why we’re trying to integrate it into the Red District as quickly as possible - once we have things settled inside the walls, we can spread it outside of them. It’ll be hard to use blatant racism to deny refugees the parts they need if the parts are put out into every district in abundance.”

There was a beat of silence, before Prompto asked, “Why are you telling me all of this?”

“You look like the kind that would take well to knowing such things.” Ignis gave a small shrug of his own, rolling his shoulder as the feeling started to return. “It’s not as if any of this is a secret. From what I’ve gathered from those that I’ve spoken to, a lot of people have been expecting - or perhaps hoping for - something like this.”

“Yeah but… you probably could have just said ‘Oh, yeah! Business stuff! No need to worry, it’s for the good of the people!’ or something,” Prompto stated, puffing up his chest a bit as he mimicked Ignis’ accent.

“And would you have believed me had I said just that? You were insinuating that I was doing something dastardly not a few minutes ago.”

“...True - I guess you’re right. I would have been more suspicious,” Prompto replied with a lopsided grin. “But I think I could take you - well - probably not - but Nyx would totally avenge me if anything happened.”

Ignis' mouth tilted up at one side. “Is that a threat?”

“That depends - you up to anything funny?”

Ignis found himself giving an amused sort of scoff, stretching his arm out and bending it a couple times to help get rid of the pins and needles that had settled into the appendage. “I can assure you, this is no laughing matter.”

“Oh - I was just -” Prompto started quickly, only to pause at the deadpan expression that had taken Ignis’ face. Prompto grinned. “ _Hey_ \- I see what you did there. Big, fancy V.P. cracks puns - think the newspaper would believe me if I told them?”

“I doubt they have the funny-bone for it,” Ignis replied without missing a beat, though he was looking down at his hand as he flexed his fingers. He hummed, somewhat impressed. “...I didn’t expect you to be able to put my arm back together.” Had there really been severed wires? Ignis found his arm felt like nothing had changed.

“ _Wow_ \- and here I thought we were having a _moment_! This must be what betrayal feels like.”

“I merely find it surprising you knew how any of it worked - as you said, most of my parts are high end. I don’t see any tools here that would make working with me an easy task, at the very least.”

Prompto rubbed under his nose before running his hand over the back of his neck. “Aw man - I didn’t do much - I mean - I like to keep up to date on stuff,” he said sheepishly. “I’m just a little mechanic with a hobby I can’t afford.”

“Don’t undermine yourself,” Ignis spoke with a frown, sending the blond a scrutinizing look. “There’s nothing in it that will bring you honest customers.” Moving to get to his feet, brushing off his pants as he did so, - frown deepening at the small tears in the fabric - Ignis turned his eyes back up to Prompto’s face. “You did well. Take the compliment.”

"Sure." The blond sent him a tight-lipped smile, getting to his feet himself. “Do you need to use the phone? I can go grab it for you - oh! I should probably grab your bag - just hold tight for a second!” Ignis barely had a moment to open his mouth before Prompto was scurrying off, nearly tripping over something as he did so; the man being left half out of his chair to sigh and rub his right temple.

This was all going to become a terrible headache later - he just knew it.

After taking a moment to collect himself and stand up straight, Ignis put his pointer finger and thumb to his right earlobe - listening for the distinctive sound of a faint ringing as he closed his eyes. He highly doubted that he had the best service in the Red District, especially with his body as dysfunctional as it was.

When no ringing came, Ignis merely gave a long sigh of displeasure. Wonderful. He was going to need several repairs, it seemed.

Prompto stumbled back into the room not a moment later, Ignis’ bag held in one hand while a cell phone was held in the other. “I didn’t touch anything in your bag - but you should probably check and see if anything’s missing,” he babbled whilst handing the bag off to Ignis. “And you can use my phone if you need to.”

Already digging through his bag, Ignis frowned at the lack of anything… missing. His wallet had all of its contents in tact - a small file had all papers accounted for - his phone was still there... It wasn’t as if he had expected to be robbed - but he had, he realized rather guiltily - considering how out of place he was in the area and how… suddenly his little accident had happened. _Had_ it been a hit and run? An accident and nothing more? Had this Nyx person merely been close enough by to stop anyone from snooping? Should he ask?

“No need,” Ignis replied instead, pulling out his own phone and narrowing his eyes at the cracks across the top of the screen. A quick tapping of the power button showed that the device was still functional. “Though I appreciate the offer.”

“Oh - okay - do you need anything el-?” Prompto started, only to for his mouth to snap shut as Ignis then reached out to quite nearly snatch Prompto’s phone from his hand.

“Actually - I’ll need to have your contact information in order to send you your compensation for offering me your aid.”

“Oh - you don’t need to worry about that!”

“Nonsense,” Ignis stated evenly, sending himself a message from Prompto’s phone. “Due payment is given for due services. You’re also lending me your spectacles. At the very least allow me to take you out for coffee, or something of the sort.”

Prompto opened his mouth to respond - several times, even - but no words left him. He only seemed to find his voice when Ignis returned his phone to him. “I - you?”

“Now, if you’ll excuse me - I need to phone someone to pick me up.”

Prompto stammered over his words for a moment or so before managing to spit out a, “I’ll just - over there - coffee - you - uh, coffee?”

Ignis smiled, though it was mostly out of amusement, at the blond. “I won’t say no, if you’re offering,” he replied simply, before turning to the side to scroll through his contacts - Gladiolus would probably be able to give him a lift. He tended to wander about some of the pubs in the area.

Whilst putting his phone to his ear, after hearing Prompto scurry off towards the door - Ignis had to cough to cover up a chuckle that threatened to escape him as he caught the bewildered voice of the blonde as the door clicked open:

“The _V.P._ of Crystal Corp. gave me his _number_ \- pinch me-!”

Of course Ignis had every intention of repaying Prompto, and his Nyx friend, for the aid - but he wasn't about to turn away the company of a clever, albiet somewhat ditzy, young man.

**Author's Note:**

> Because everyone loves a good robot au.  
> But really - this has been rolling around in my head for a few days and is the first in a series of AU one-shots.  
> I might break that trend (on the first one-shot, no less) and give this another installment at a later date.
> 
> Come chat @ImperfectAlias on Tumblr!


End file.
